Nowadays, the presence of advertising is becoming an integral part of our everyday lives. Advertising investments made by certain companies to enter what appear to be the most lucrative markets with the intention of obtaining greater profits, are endless.
Of these markets, the fastest growing sector in relation to advertising is the world of sports, to the point that the main item of revenue in club budgets is based on financial contributions from advertising.
Most of this advertising is arranged in the clubs sports facilities; even some sports arenas change their name depending on who the official sponsor of the club is. Among the advertising that can be found in a sports arena, the most relevant (and therefore which provides greater profits) is advertising which is arranged near or at the actual surface of the playing field, and which, in the event of a television broadcast in the sports arena, is seen by thousands or even millions of viewers.
Given everything described, advertising companies are constantly in search of new formulas that enable more efficient advertising.
For example, one of these formulas is based on arranging advertising on the surface of the playing field by means of canvas banners or similar directly on said surface, but the main drawback of this solution is that viewing the advertising is quite complex both for viewers and the spectators in the sports arena.
Another formula is based on arranging the advertising on vertical media around the playing field, enabling the proper viewing of advertising both for the attendees at the sporting event and spectators who are, for example, watching from home. Said solution has the disadvantage that sports men and women participating in the sporting event may suffer a minor accident if they hit or bump into said media, that is to say, said vertical media pose a risk to the physical safety of sports men and women. As this solution has evolved, vertical LEDs (Light Emitting Diodes) have been developed, where the advertising is carried out electronically, although the drawbacks are the same as those described for the previous solution.
Several solutions have been adopted from these drawbacks, based on the application of geometric techniques (more specifically, the geometry of perspective). Said solutions, applying methods for obtaining transformations of the advertising images to be shown, aim to simulate the presence of more or less vertical media from media arranged horizontally on the surface of the playing field in the sports arena. Therefore, these solutions draw together the advantages of advertising media arranged on the surface of the playing field (they do not pose a risk to the physical safety of the sports men and women) and those involving the vertical media (excellent visibility of the advertising, mainly for viewers).
One of these solutions is described in the European patent EP 0599920 B2, entitled “Applying an inverse perspective transformation of an image to a surface, for subsequent image pick-up” (in Spanish, “Aplicación de una transformación en perspectiva inversa de una imagen a una superficie, para tomar la imagen a continuación”). Said European patent describes a method for representing an image that is based on obtaining the transformation of the image from obtaining an inverse perspective transformation thereof and applying said transformation on the surface of the playing field, such that, when the transformation is seen along the line of vision which corresponds to the line of vision that has been used for the inverse perspective transformation, the image appears to be situated on a plane forming a right angle with the aforementioned line of vision, that is to say, the image is shown facing an appropriate observer (for example, a mobile image camera). Obviously, the line of vision is the one that is established between the observer and the image (it can be understood to be a virtual image).
As shown in FIG. 1, the main drawback of said solution is that, since an inverse perspective transformation of the image is performed, it is inherent to it that the baseline of the transformation 10 should be arranged perpendicular to the line of vision 11, as described in the European patent, which means that the space required to “apply” an inverse perspective transformation on the surface of the playing field (for example, if one is to be arranged at one of the ends of the surface of the playing field, close to the goals or baskets) should have relatively large dimensions and not all sports arenas do.
The European patent EP 0968495 B2, entitled “Figurative print and a plane print carrier and use of such figurative print” (in Spanish, “Cartel publicitario Impreso en un portacarteles plano y use de dicho cartel”), describes another possible solution for presenting advertising, for example, in a sports arena.
In said European patent document, figurative print comprising a first figurative element representing an advertisement in a first dimension and a second dimension is described, which, when seen in a given oblique direction between an observer and the figurative print, shows the first and second dimension forming an advertising plane that is directed obliquely forward, preferably perpendicular to the print carrier. Additionally, the figurative print further comprises a second figurative element cartel that represents the advertisement in a third dimension, such that when it is seen in a certain oblique direction between the observer and the figurative print, it displays the third dimension as directed perpendicularly to the figurative print plane.
The main advantage presented by said solution is the complexity of obtaining the figurative print or advertising medium. Basically, because the problem to be solved is that the figurative print should appear in the best way possible for a chosen observer, maintaining the appearance that the figurative print is a constituent part of the environment of other spectators, it is necessary for the second figurative element forms certain angles with the first dimension and the second dimension and that, in addition, the values of said angles are located at certain intervals. It is therefore essential that the advertising image to be displayed has three defined dimensions (x-y-z).
Furthermore, any of the solutions described that use transformations of the advertising images require the positions of the observer and the medium to be the same as those used to obtain the transformation of the image to be displayed.
Any movement by the observer (for example, a television camera) or the advertising medium in relation to the predefined position, causes the image to be displayed incorrectly.